


Return From Wonderland

by sabaceanbabe



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-06
Updated: 2010-06-06
Packaged: 2017-10-09 21:30:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/91808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabaceanbabe/pseuds/sabaceanbabe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>All he wanted was to return to his old life, his old self, to turn off whatever switch had been turned on in his brain.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Return From Wonderland

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [](http://mamaboolj.livejournal.com/profile)[**mamaboolj**](http://mamaboolj.livejournal.com/) and [](http://lee-in-limbo.livejournal.com/profile)[**lee_in_limbo**](http://lee-in-limbo.livejournal.com/) for the quick beta. Written for challenge #1 - Return, at [](http://community.livejournal.com/heroes_contest/profile)[**heroes_contest**](http://community.livejournal.com/heroes_contest/).

Peter stared at the pills in the palm of his hand. Memories chased each other in his head, futile as a dog chasing its tail. Nathan. His mother. Claude. Simone and her father. Hiro. Sylar. But above them all, Nathan. Nathan as he'd last seen him, skin puckering and melting away.

He closed his eyes, but couldn't erase the memories. All he wanted was to return to his old life, his old self, to turn off whatever switch had been turned on in his brain. Or to remove it completely. He'd never asked for this and he didn't want it now, to be able to do six impossible things before breakfast. Peter laughed at himself, the sound as bitter as the aftertaste of the pills would be.

He'd gone down the rabbit hole, alright. Gone down it in a ball of nuclear flame. Now he was here, where they'd managed to turn off his abilities. They claimed they'd be able to turn them off for good, to cure him so there'd be no more little green-and-white pills. He bounced them in his hand, once, twice.

But Adam, a man he knew only as a voice on the other side of the concrete wall, said they were using him, that he was a prisoner and that no one was working on any cure. Adam said they'd never let him go. And Peter was starting to believe him.

At first Bob, an innocuous little man who looked like an insurance salesman, had regularly visited Peter, bringing Elle with him. Bob had spoken of doctors and scientists working day and night on a cure for Peter and those like him. But then Bob came less often and Elle more.

Pretty, broken Elle, who brought Peter the drugs that took away his powers. Who talked to him, brought a taste of life and energy to days that were otherwise dull and colorless. And who scared the crap out of him. His nose still tingled from the _energy_ she'd gifted him with just a few minutes ago, when she'd given him the pills and then been called away before she could watch him take them.

Adam's words suddenly vied in his head for precedence over his memories, adding themselves as a soundtrack to the indelible picture of Nathan falling through the sky, burning.

_This is a prison, Peter, this place you call a "facility." They'll never let you go, man, anymore than they've let me go and I've been here for thirty years._

Peter stared at the green-and-white pills in the palm of his hand. He thought of Adam and of Elle and of Nathan. He thought of Claire, and how she refused to ever give up.

Before he could stop himself, Peter turned his hand over. The little green-and-white pills dropped into the toilet, floated for an instant on the water's surface. And then Peter exerted pressure on the handle, and the little pills swirled away into oblivion.


End file.
